F24 Vermont Wind Ensemble

Undertow - John Makey
YouTube Audio (with score) YouTube video (ensemble from northern Italy - Makey liked the performance!)

Undertow contains many “signature” elements of John Mackey’s compositional style: half-step dissonance, use of ostinati, shifting meters, and extensive use of percussion. The alternating 7/8 and 4/4 meter found throughout most of the piece give it a small structure inconsistency of beat that seems strangely expected after a number of repetitions. The piece begins with an energetic opening section that fades away into long note melodies with percussive underpinnings. The energetic section returns, but is interrupted by a percussion interlude. The rest of the ensemble and percussion trade off briefly before a softer section, all in 4/4 meter, builds to a final return to the original material.

The Latin text of O Magnum Mysterium, a responsorial chant from the celebration of Christmas, depicts the "great mystery" ("magnum mysterium") that animals in a manger should witness the birth of Jesus, and offers blessings to his mother. American composer Morten Lauridsen, Professor of Music at the University of Southern California, describes his popular setting as containing a "profound inner joy." .

At the time that he wrote Skyscapes, David Moore was in between teaching positions and was working as a school representative for a local music store. In that position, he came in contact with Duane Anderson, conductor of the Odebolt-Arthur High School Band, in Odebolt, Iowa. As the two got to know one another, Mr. Moore’s background as a band composer came up, so Mr. Anderson asked him to write a piece for his band to perform at Iowa's large group festival, the state's big spring band event. Not only did the Odebolt-Arthur High School perform the piece on the festival, they were give a superior rating, the highest rating possible, for their performance.

Percy Grainger (1882-1961) is known as one of the most prolific composers of music for wind band. While many of his pieces are based on or utilize folk melodies, Children's March, despite its folk song quality, does not: many of the tunes sound like folksongs, but they are original compositions. The piece was written in 1918 when Grainger served as a musician in the United State Coast Artillery Band, after moving to America from his native Australia. The piece begins with a short introductory theme stated by the bassoon and saxophones, and supported by clarinets and horns. The low brass conclude the introduction and usher in the first theme, heard by the bassoon and baritone saxophone. These two themes, so similar to one another that they were clearly conceived of as a unit, are varied in an ebb and flow that ends as it began, with an inversion of the theme fading away in the bassoon and low brass, reflecting the subtitle of the piece: Over the Hills and Far Away.

Alligator Alley is the nickname for the east-west stretch of Interstate 75 between Naples and Ft. Lauderdale that crosses through the Florida Everglades National Park. It is home of the American alligator: “King of the Everglades.” There are two main musical themes in Alligator Alley. The "alligator’s theme" is played by the bassoons. In 5/4 time, the theme evokes the way the animal slithers through the Everglades. The "hunter's theme," played by the brass, reminds us of the hunters and poachers who trap and kill the alligator for profit. The slapstick evokes the sound of the alligator snapping its large and very strong jaws. - Michael Daugherty

Sketches on a Tudor Psalm is based on a 16th century setting of the Second Psalm by Thomas Tallis. The original setting was in a church mode with irregular three, four, and five-beat melodic phrases (a modern adaptation of this tune is still used today in Anglican services). This tune is also the basis of Ralph Vaughn Williams' Fantasia for String Orchestra (1910). In Sketches, the theme is first heard by solo alto saxophone, expanded in scope by the horn section, and expanded again when it is heard, with harmony, by all the brass. A set of variations begins with the neutral sounds of percussion at a new, faster tempo. The theme finally returns in the lower woodwinds before being stated by the entire ensemble. The dissonance of some of the variations and the absence of a full ensemble statement of the theme at the end of the piece signal the transformation of man by the trials of the world, yet the A major chord in the final measure assures us that the outcome of these trials is positive.

Vermont Wind Ensemble - Fall '24